It's absolutely crucial to maintain my life as a poet.
Edward HirschRead
Rhythm is sound in motion. It is related to the pulse, the heartbeat, the way we breathe. It rises and falls. It takes us into ourselves; it takes us out of ourselves.
Interpretation
Rhythm reflects the dynamic flow of life and emotions, connecting us deeply to ourselves and the world.
This quote suggests that rhythm is more than just a musical element; it embodies the essence of life itself. It encapsulates the natural cycles of existence—like our heartbeat and breath—drawing us inward for introspection while simultaneously connecting us outward to our experiences and surroundings. Rhythm, therefore, acts as a bridge between our internal and external worlds, highlighting the beauty of movement and change.
In practice
Using this quote in a speech about the importance of music in human experience.
It's absolutely crucial to maintain my life as a poet.
The commitment to working at poetry is important because a poet is a maker, and a poem is a made thing. We have to honor our feelings by working to transform them into something meaningful and lasting.
As far as I'm concerned, freedom is the most important thing to creativity. You should feel free to write in whatever way, whatever language, feels comfortable to you.
The idea that a poem was a made thing stayed with me, and I decided then that I wanted to be an artist, not just a diarist. So I put myself through a kind of apprenticeship in writing poetry, and I understood even then that my practice as a poet was deeply related to my reading.
And every year there is a brief, startling moment _x000D_ When we pause in the middle of a long walk home and _x000D_ Suddenly feel something invisible and weightless _x000D_ Touching our shoulders, sweeping down from the air: _x000D_ It is the autumn wind pressing against our bodies; _x000D_ It is the changing light of fall falling on us.
When poetry separates from song, then the words have to carry all the rhythm themselves; they have to do all the work. They can't rely on the singing voice.
What I end up shooting is the situation. I shoot the composition and my subject is going to help the composition or not.
The advice I would give to any photographer - young, old or in-between - is to explore anything visual because this is, after all, how you express your artistry. Look at paintings, movies, drawings, sculptures - look at anything visual and try to integrate that into your visual sense. After that, go out and take pictures and keep on taking pictures!
To photograph people is to violate them, by seeing them as they never see themselves, by having knowledge of them that they can never have; it turns people into objects that can be symbolically possessed. Just as a camera is a sublimation of the gun, to photograph someone is a subliminal murder - a soft murder, appropriate to a sad, frightened time.
Poetry has been to me its own exceeding great reward; it has given me the habit of wishing to discover the good and beautiful in all that meets and surrounds me.
If I create from the heart, nearly everything works; if from the head, almost nothing.
When I started, I was an artist; I wanted to be an artist. I became an actor almost by accident. I acted for fifteen years and tried to produce. I looked for stories that were the story beneath the story that you thought you knew, like 'The Candidate'.
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